


With A Rusty Pipe

by Bunnys Homicidal Giggle (KelsyLokelani)



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Explicit Language, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-10
Updated: 2012-09-10
Packaged: 2017-11-13 23:50:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/509102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KelsyLokelani/pseuds/Bunnys%20Homicidal%20Giggle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly's having the worst day of her life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	With A Rusty Pipe

**Author's Note:**

> This comes from a headcanon that my friend Leilani and I have, being in which Molly only swears when the last straw has broken the camel's back.
> 
> So I wrote this for her.
> 
> I also wasn't sure what to tag it, so I'm sorry if it's wrong.  
> Unbeta'd and unbritpicked.

Today was not going well for Molly. In fact, it was going downright bloody badly, by her standards. She'd woken up late—again—and missed the Tube, so she had to catch a cab to work, meaning she had to miss her first cup of coffee of the day, and she ran straight into her boss on the way into the lab.

Literally.

She collided into the older woman, who gave her a stern glare over the frames of severe metal glasses.

"Oh!" she squeaked, jumping back and patting her hair back into place in its hastily done ponytail. "I'm so sorry, Dr Collins!" She straightened her shirt under her jacket and tried to edge around to get her lab coat.

"Molly," Dr Collins started, consulting the clipboard that she'd had under her arm, "This is the fifth time you've been late in the last month." Molly froze in place, then ducked her head as a silver eyebrow lifted.

"I'm sorry—I don't try to be late, I just have the worst luck with the Tube," she replied.

"Don't let it happen again," Dr Collins finished, sidestepping Molly.

She worked through her lunch break to make up for being late. Nobody noticed.

-

Towards the end of her shift, Sherlock waltzed into the lab (there really wasn't any other word for it, if Molly was honest with herself), obviously on another case and not just for the equipment based on the way his flatmate was nagging after him.

“Sherlock, you need to bloody eat,” John was saying. “No matter what you seem to think, you can’t possibly expect to survive off of nicotine, adrenaline, and caffeine!” Sherlock only made a brief moment’s eye contact with Molly—and her heart fluttered dangerously in her ribcage—before giving his eyes a roll that seemed to go through his whole body to John. “You just rolled your eyes. Sherlock, you’re not a damn teenager, you’re a grown man!”

Despite how her day had gone so far and that she wasn’t so sure Sherlock was even allowed access, she let him in. She might’ve hovered a bit, though, which caused him to round on her about an hour and a half into his visit.

“Haven’t you got other places to be?” he snapped, looking up from the dropper he held for a brief moment. Molly startled and took a few steps back.

“Well, I’m honestly not sure if you’re supposed to be here,” she replied, hoping her voice stayed perfectly even. He glanced up again and lifted an eyebrow, causing her to feel like her face was flushing tomato red. “I’ll get some coffee, I haven’t had any yet today.”

She scurried from the room, but not quick enough to miss the reproaching, “Sherlock...” John aimed at the detective and the answering noisy sigh.

As she got her coffee, she thought she’d surprise Sherlock and John and picked up a few more coffees from the cafeteria the way she’d had drilled into her head by Sherlock from their early visits: one plain black, and the other black with two sugars.

When she came back, Molly noticed that the others hadn’t realized she’d left the door open—or they didn’t care. John was standing behind Sherlock, who was leaned back against John’s chest, and John had his arms around Sherlock’s middle and his face pressed into Sherlock’s curls. The fingers on one of Sherlock’s hands were laced between the fingers on one of John’s, and the expression on his face while he waited for whatever results it was he’d come to find was one of quiet contentment and concentration that Molly felt was too private for her to have seen. She tripped on the loose, metal threshold into the lab on her way in, the contact from her trainers making it clang and clatter, and spilled all three cups all over herself and the linoleum floor.

“Oh—oh, no,” she groaned, stooping to pick up the paper cups from the floor and biting her tongue to hold back a tiny swear that she really wanted to scream from the top of her lungs. She was a polite girl, she wouldn’t swear, not a bit.

“Molly, you really need to be more careful,” Sherlock commented dryly. Her face burned, and she could feel tears welling. No, no, no, no, this wasn’t the day she’d wanted. She blinked the tears away just as John came over, carrying two large handfuls of the flimsy paper towels the lab supplied.

“Don’t listen to him,” John said warmly, crouching to mop up the spilled coffee. “You know how he gets on cases.”

Regardless, Molly couldn’t hold back a tiny hiccupped sob of “Damn!” as she stacked up the cups and plucked sadly at her coffee-soaked blouse.

John stopped where he was, halfway between standing and crouching, hands full of sodden paper towels. “You alright?” he asked.

“Yes, John, Molly is fine. I need your help over here,” Sherlock interrupted. “I also need you to phone Lestrade, I think I’ve got it.” John sighed and finished standing, then deposited the coffee towels into the bin by the door. “Hurry up!” Sherlock groused. John made a bit of an irritated noise in the back of his throat.

“Can you wait, then?” John walked over and dug Sherlock’s phone out of his pocket and made a call. Molly cleaned up the spilled coffee as John talked and Sherlock interjected with the occasional bit of his own brand of commentary.

In less than ten minutes, Sherlock was letting out a frustrated noise and there was a knock on the doorframe of the lab before Detective Inspector Lestrade strode in, whistling a tune Sherlock obviously recognized by his other frustrated noise. Lestrade glanced over Molly as he came in, then paused and came over to touch fingers to her shoulders. “What happened? You alright?” he asked, brows furrowing.

“Lestrade, go back to the Yard,” Sherlock demanded, dropping something to the worktop with a clatter. “This isn’t the result I was looking for, and you flirting with Molly isn’t going to help anything.” Lestrade turned, setting his palms at Molly’s shoulders, and stared Sherlock down.

“No, I’m not going anywhere, and I’m not bloody _flirting_ ,” he retorted. “Doctor Hooper’s obviously not having the best day, yeah?” Molly’s face started burning again, especially when Sherlock turned his X-Raying look onto her.

“Please, don’t—don’t worry about me!” she squeaked, reaching up to bat Lestrade’s hands away. “It’s alright! Days where a little thing goes wrong happen all the time! I just spilled a little coffee is all.”

“You dropped three cups of it because you tripped on the threshold,” Sherlock pointed out. “You’re not normally that clumsy, though you do have a little bit of clumsiness to work with because you struggle getting your gloves on sometimes.” Molly ducked her head. “Your voice wavered when you told me off earlier, and your hands are shaking a small amount; not enough to hinder, but enough that you’ve noticed. You worked through lunch, didn’t you? So you were late, again, and got told off by Dr Collins.” The tears welled again, and Molly kept her face down, tried to keep it hidden.

“Sherlock.” The sound of hand smoothing over a cloth-covered back barely made it across the lab, and Molly looked up through her lashes. John was rubbing his palm over Sherlock’s back and sliding an arm around his shoulders. “So what? What does any of that have to do with anything?” John responded to Sherlock’s deductions, face set in a serious expression.

“Molly’s day is going badly. She says not to worry, but that’s what she wants,” Sherlock snapped. Molly couldn’t fight a wince as she dropped her eyes. A hand touched her shoulder. When she peeked up, it was Lestrade looking at her. His eyebrows were creased together.

“I really mean it, Sherlock!” The tears since blinked away a second time, Molly lifted her head and tried to assert herself. “Don’t worry about me,” she said. “It’s also the end of my shift. I have to ask you to leave so I don’t get in more trouble.” John squeezed Sherlock’s upper arm and murmured at him; the words barely carried and Molly couldn’t make them out, but they got Sherlock out of the lab so she could lock up.

Lestrade stayed back with her as she tidied, and she almost cried with relief when he stopped to pull paper towels from the dispenser and mop up the last little bits of spilled coffee. As they left the room, he binned the paper towels and the paper cups and scooped something from the counter by the door. Molly paid it no attention, figuring it was just something he’d put there when he came in. She locked the door to the lab and headed off to return the keys. Lestrade tailed after her. She thought he looked a little silly with a dusty rose pink strap hooked over his shoulder, standing out massively against the dark navy of his New Scotland Yard windbreaker.

He still walked with her, hands in his trouser pockets and thankfully quiet, and didn’t say anything when she stopped and muttered, “Damn it!” and gave her foot a tiny stomp. She glanced at him worriedly, hoping he didn’t think less of her for saying that. He grinned a bit, just an upturn of one corner of his mouth, and just for barely a moment.

“Sorry. Shouldn’t be smiling, should I?” he apologized. “What’s wrong? Forget something?” The tone of his voice suggested he knew something she didn’t, and that just frustrated her a tiny little smidgen more than it should have.

“My purse! I locked it in the lab!” she exclaimed, crossing her arms. Lestrade shifted, almost uncomfortable. “Oh, damn it all to hell!” Molly gave her foot another stomp, then started down the hallway. There wasn’t anything important in her purse; just the keys to her flat, and her oyster card, and all of her money and identification.

They continued down the hallway, and Molly was almost out the door, almost free, almost to the long walk almost across London to her home, where maybe she would get her landlord to let her into her flat, and she could curl up on the sofa with Toby and watch some stupid Jeremy Kyle.

Her toe caught on the threshold of the big front doors. She stumbled out and nearly fell on her face onto the sidewalk. There could have been nothing worse than that.

“Shit! Shit, shit, fuck, God _damn_ it!” she wailed, ignoring the way Lestrade blinked in surprise and reached out to steady her as she regained her footing. “Fuck _everything_ today in the loose, gaping asshole with a rusty _pipe_!” she shrieked. Once the phrase left her mouth, she stopped still. Lestrade’s hand was still warm on her elbow. He didn’t even sound like he was breathing. Molly pulled away from his grip and covered her face with both of her hands, trying her hardest to muffle the horrifyingly loud and incredibly mortifying sobs that broke free.

Over her sobs, she heard a windbreaker rustle, and there was a palm rubbing soothing lines over her back and fingers scratching gentle circles between her shoulder blades. She should have found it too intimate, especially when that turned into being gathered tenderly against Lestrade’s chest and having one of his hands softly cradling the curve of her skull under her ponytail. He was still rubbing her back, too.

“Sorry—” she started to apologize, voice creaking and breaking. “Sorry, Detective Inspector—”

“Greg,” Lestrade interrupted. His voice rumbled through his chest, and Molly quieted a little further. “You can call me Greg. And you—you don’t have to apologize,” he continued, dropping the hand that’d been resting against her hair. Molly parted her fingers and peered up at him, noting in an almost ridiculously teenager-like fashion that he was resolutely not looking at her and his ears were pink. Not to mention the dusty-rose pink strap over his shoulder was—

“My purse!” Molly slid her fingers over the strap and hooked them under, then tugged it from his shoulder. He let it go and stepped back easily, finally daring a glance when she slung the purse strap onto her own shoulder. “Thank you,” she said sheepishly, smoothing a few loose hairs back and sweeping the sides of her hands under her eyes. Lestrade pulled a packet of tissues from his windbreaker pocket and peeled it open, then plucked one out and offered it over. She took it gratefully and mopped up her face.

“Hey—er, this might not be what you need, or it might be, but—well—do you want to get a coffee with me? We can stop somewhere else and get good stuff,” Lestrade offered, tucking the tissues back into his pocket. Molly giggled shakily and crumpled the tissue in her hands.

“Yeah, I think I’d like that,” she said, smiling brighter than she had all day. Her mood had certainly been lifted. Lestrade’s face lifted, and he grinned right back at her.

“I drove my own car—” He gestured at the dark car parked by the curb. “—so we don’t have to deal with the Tube or cabs.” He stepped over and pulled the passenger side door open. “After you, _Mademoiselle_.” His grin turned a bit cheeky, and Molly giggled again, more sure, as she slid into the seat.

“Thank you, Greg,” she chirped. He shut the door and got in on the driver’s side, reaching over to give her shoulder a squeeze as he started the car. “My day’s loads better already!”


End file.
